Thoughts from the interface of science, religion, law and culture

After spending several years touring the country as a stand up comedian, Ed Brayton tired of explaining his jokes to small groups of dazed illiterates and turned to writing as the most common outlet for the voices in his head. He has appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show and the Thom Hartmann Show, and is almost certain that he is the only person ever to make fun of Chuck Norris on C-SPAN.

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A New Low for Erick Erickson

Just in case you thought that Erick Erickson has been as big as asshole as he could be, he never misses an opportunity to be as much of a dickhead as a person could possibly be. Here’s his reaction to the news that the new pope had a cozy relationship to the Argentinian dictatorships:

Yeah, I’d like to do this guy what they did in the movie, The Gods Must be Crazy. Blindfold him, take him up in a helicopter a couple hundred feet, gently bring the helicopter down to about 2 feet and push him out.

Then I’d make him walk around all day with the shit still in his pants.

… hustled aboard fixed-wing aircraft or helicopters, stripped naked and pushed into the … 1 Death flights during the Dirty War in Argentina; 2 Use in other conflicts … for his role in the disappearance of 41 people, and ordered him held without bail. … killed, among them 18 women and a group of prisoners thrown from aircraft.

Eric Erickson’s heroes.

Read the wikipedia article if you want but don’t expect to sleep well tonight.

@3 and 4 I think the word you are looking for is Reactionary. That would seem to capture most of it the fact that reacting to ‘liberals’ is the whole of their politics, the further right than conservatives tone and the strange belief that reality will go away if you shout at it loud enough.

A common characteristic of conservatives is the inability to comprehend irony. I’m sure it will never register with this clown that his thinking exactly parallels the Nazi collaborators of the 1930’s and 40’s.

We gotta remember we’re dealing with right wing world. In right wing world there are good guys and bad guys. Good guys like the US and right wing regimes never do bad things, only bad guys. Mi Lai, all the innocents in Iraq, american indians, etc, etc, are done by the good guys so they may be unfortunate events but not atrocities. Right wing regime atrocities, Pinochet, East Timor, Palestinians are also done by good guys so are no big deal. Of course Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao,Saddam Hussain etc, these are the bad guys, who by definition are the only ones who ever do bad things.

Actually, if anything, it’s the all-powerful, absolutist, tyrant of all space and time who will punish all the people they hate (i.e. “perverted” gays, bleeding-heart liberals, dirty commies, etc.) that they don’t like. Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, is just the carrot while Yahweh is the big stick with nails.

You’re putting the emphasis on the wrong words. It’s not “murderous and repressive Rightwing junta”, It’s “murderous and repressive Rightwing junta“. In other words, they so-called “murdered” and so-called “repressed” the correct groups. I could see outrage if it had been, say, a “murderous and repressive Populist Left-leaning democracy”, but you Chavez loving Liberty-haters always ignore those (“Whine whine whine”, you say, “America overthrew such and such and replaced them with dictators”. Pah!).
Therefore, these Rightwing regimes were okay. Laudable, even, for their commitment to Freedom and Democracy (that liberalleftistChiComs hate them for standing up for those things, in fact, proves they were on the right track). Yes, a few so-called “innocent” people might have (emphasis on “might”) been so-called “tortured” and/or so-called “killed”, but let me ask you something, “If they were so innocent why did they admit being terrorists while they were being so-called ‘tortured’?” And, yes, 10,000 people were disappeared by the State, but that’s nothing compared to the 6,000 casualties by the Leftwing terrorists, some of whom were such crafty Communists that the only evidence they were involved is that they were students or they belonged to a union.

Pinochet and Franco and the Shah and South Africa’s Apartheid regimes were great, too, for all the same reasons. You liberals are just mad because the Right is right, even when Rightwing leaders do the very things they damn the other side for doing. Our side does the so-called “wrong” things for the right reasons, unlike you pinkos!

Look, if you want a bloody omelette you have to throw a few eggs out of helicopters. That’s just common sense.

Once again, don’t want to have to polish the turd amid all this rightful gloating. But surely what the crackpot meant was he adorse the Pope for getting lefties pants in a bunch. He’s projecting his own victim-fantasies onto “lefties”, and gloating over how petty we are to conjure up all this false outrage over a clearly discredited claim (that the pope helped murder people).

I mean it’s rather twisted and disrespectful of the casualties and suffering of actual people during that period, but he’s not actually saying what you think he’s saying.

Rob Waldeck ‏@Robertwaldeck
@EWErickson please tell me you are not in support of execution of political prisoners.
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13 Mar Erick Erickson ‏@EWErickson
@Robertwaldeck of course not.
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13 Mar Rob Waldeck ‏@Robertwaldeck
@EWErickson the wording of that tweet made it unclear. Glad to hear.
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13 Mar Erick Erickson ‏@EWErickson
@Robertwaldeck laughing at the attacks, not supporting the accusation, which is false by the way.

One would do well to consider the massive amount of douchebaggery that has enemanated from Ericscum’s piehole over the last several years. He meant what he said in the original tweet.. He’s a fuckdouche, a coward and a liar.

As for the accusation of the pope’s formerly collaborating with the junta being false? that’s not exactly a settled issue.

Erickson no doubt said the same thing about Batista imprisoning and killing people in Cuba. A person does not have to be a communist to oppose fascism.

Supposed “leftists” killed by fascist dictatorships (e.g. Argentina, Chile, Nicaragua) often weren’t “leftists”. They were pro-democracy activists, and the US supported pro-US regimes over democracies that would act in other nations’ own interests.

One would do well to consider the massive amount of douchebaggery that has enemanated from Ericscum’s piehole over the last several years.

Why? Why is that relevant to this issue, this tweet? I mean from what I’ve looked at of his opinions, he is a douchebag, but that’s completely beside the point here. The comments on here are implying Erickson agreed with throwing “lefties” out of planes and was happy that the pope was collaborating with fascists. He didn’t mean that (clarified this as I linked) because his (also assholish) point was that he feels that the left has jumped onto the issue before its been investigated, using any excuse possible to vilify the new pope. Erickson as a “conservative”, obviously thinks such sensationalist tactics show idiocy, predjudice and ideological bias on the left, and it makes him gleeful to think the new pope has brought out such a reaction.
It’s analogous to progressives laughing at right-wing nutjobs talking about Obama’s FEMA camps, Death Panels and communist takeover.

The actual facts of Francis’ collaboration/non-collaboration aren’t crucial to the point, which was about allegations, except of course if new information comes out showing he does have blood on his hands I guess conservatives like Erickson should apologise (fat luck), but then we might have another resigning pope on our hands in that case anyway.

“He meant what he said in the original tweet.”
Yes, he meant that he adores the pope for making the “lefties” rush to crazy overblown conclusions and show what he probably considers their (our?) victim complex.

Yes, he meant that he adores the pope for making the “lefties” rush to crazy overblown conclusions and show what he probably considers their (our?) victim complex.

But that doesn’t make sense. The new Pope, if he is innocent of the charges, didn’t “make” the left rush to any conclusions, he would be a victim of them. Does anyone “adore” victims simply because they are victims? Mussolini was the victim of a lynching … but adore him?

Of course, we may be asking too much of Erickson to expect him to be even minimally articulate but it can hardly be crazy overblown conclusions to think that he is, based on his tweet, adoring the possibility that the “lefties” are right.

Crip Dyke, MQ, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaidensays

“He didn’t mean that (clarified this as I linked) because his (also assholish) point was that he feels that the left has jumped onto the issue before its been investigated, using any excuse possible to vilify the new pope.”

Really? Erickson is a fucking liar. That he would lie to you or anyone else is as predictable as the sun rising in the East.

Based on a number of years of Erickson’s indignorantly arroggant screeds about the leftist monsters under the bed trying to drag MurKKKa into a secular hell, I would not guess that he meant other than what he tweeted. You may choose to do so; that would indicate that you are a forgiving and naive person.

Of course, we may be asking too much of Erickson to expect him to be even minimally articulate but it can hardly be crazy overblown conclusions to think that he is, based on his tweet, adoring the possibility that the “lefties” are right.

The specific allegation that Bergoglio betrayed two lefty Jesuits to the junta may or may not be true – although the relatives of the one who has died appear to credit it, and the one still alive, while saying he’s “reconciled” to what happened, has notably stopped short of acquitting him of such an action.